pulling out of syria is the right thing to do; i pointed it out here some time ago.

yes - russia is likely to gain the upper hand inside syria. but, that's inevitable. whatever objectives existed in 2011 are no longer meaningful.

the major objectives for america in the region need to be the following:

1) maintain and rebuild the turkish alliance.
2) minimizing iranian influence in the halls of power in turkey & iraq, rather than on the battlefield. you can't fight this war when every government in the region is against you. the way to contain iran right now is to rebuild bridges in iraq - and in turkey.
3) a reanalysis of russian capabilities, and an acceptance of the return of russian power.

at the end of the day, we might end up lucky that it isn't hillary clinton making these choices.

it's saigon all over again.

and, they can lose this war the easy way or the hard way.